I saw 'em in the spring of 1990. Their set was about what I'd expected, maybe a little better. It was definitely one of the loudest shows I've ever attended. 22 years later, I vividly recall losing my mind during "Kill Surf City" and "Sidewalking"...

However: Nine Inch Nails opened and blew the house down. My roommate had picked up Pretty Hate Machine a few weeks earlier, so we thought we had a decent idea of what to expect from their 30 or 40 minute set, but we were wrong. It was intense.

i aw them also at the same time period. at the time i wasnt too familar with either band. i went basically cause i liked the combination of the 2 names.
nine inch nails/jesus.
preety much agree with jermoes assessment

I saw them on the same tour as Jermoe in Nashville (at the Cannery). I wouldn't say that NIN was better that night. . . though I've never liked NIN and have always been a huge JAMC fan. I remember so much dry ice that it was hard to see the band. The show was great, though.

I saw the J&MC on one of the Lollapalooza tours. They were on the main stage, and as Erik said, they were lost in all the dry ice fog. It's always irritating when a band overdoes it with the fog machines, but at 4:00 in the afternoon at an outdoor venue? Deeply bogus. It looked as though the J&MC had decided to host a barbecue onstage (which would've been a nice gesture, come to think of it), and things had gotten severely out of control. They sure sounded great, though.

I don't know if I'd say Nine Inch Nails put on a better show than JAMC that night, but I had much lower expectations for Nine Inch Nails. Having heard the debut album, I was figuring on a couple of guys with keyboards, the occasional guitar and possibly a drummer...what I got was a flat-out assault.

When they covered Queen's "Get Down, Make Love," about half the crowd was asking one another "are these guys actually covering Queen?" (a thoroughly uncool thing to even consider doing in Athens, GA in 1990), while the other half of the crowd was standing around the lobby of the Georgia Theater wondering when these guys were going to get off the stage.

I've never considered myself a NIN fan, but I bought the "Sin"/"Get Down, Make Love" CD single when it came out a few months after that show.

looked as though the J&MC had decided to host a barbecue onstage (which would've been a nice gesture, come to think of it)

"Honey's Dead BBQ Sauce?"

...

I've seen 'em live four times that I can remember. Once was a Lollapalooza gig in broad daylight that did NOT work for them artistically. The freshly-exhumed pallor that they'd cultivated looked all wrong in broad daylight. The sidemen looked like roadies hurriedly pressed into service. It all sounded rather MOR.

However, every other time I've seen them, they were GREAT.

Saw 'em with Spiritualized and Curve. Was that the Rollercoaster Tour?

Even met Jim Reid a few years later after what was (at that time) their last gig on their last tour. In Philadelphia, no less. In the rain, no less. Ben Lurie played the entire set in William's place, as he'd apparently already quit and they were just running out the string of obligations. It was still a great show. I had Mr. Reid autograph my cigarette box, as I was too #$%^& up to fish the ticket stub out of my pocket.

"Psychocandy" is one of my all-time favorite records of all time. Even.

Even though I already own every god-damned B-side collection they've ever put out, I still bought that god-damned "Power of Negative Thinking" collection - which trumps all previous collections - until they put out the next one. I know this only encourages them.

Still, I love that band. The white noise/subway screeching finale of "Head" may be the finest 20 seconds of sound ever committed to tape.